Taken by Space Pirates: A SciFi Alien Romance (Bound to the Alien Book 2) (2 page)

I was unsettled by his brief moment of tenderness. I had to harden myself against him or the
Pogona
, the biological drive to couple with my bondmate
,
would take me. There was nothing but misery in that path. I paced the edges of the room. I prickled with need for him, to touch me, take me, breed me.

I stared down at the bindings on my wrists and the hobbles on my ankles. It was more comfortable than the agonizing first night, but it enraged me to be bound so. It was a visual representation of everything I hated. A tone rang out, and the loosened lead between my wrists shrank, pulling them back together.

Someone walked into the room. To my surprise, it wasn't him, but a woman. A Rikian by the green tint to her skin and her pointy ears. She did not appear happy to see me. She circled me, looking me up and down. I wanted to use my hands to cover myself. I knew my gown was shredded and hid very little.

"If it were up to me, you'd have been blasted into space first thing." She spat the words out.

"Really? I thought you wanted me as a handbag?" I was assuming this was the infamous first mate.

"That's my current plan. He'll get bored enough playing with a prissy little princess."

I stared at her. Show no fear. I could smell her agitation and anger. She was barely holding on to her rage but hid it well. But she stank of it. Anything I did could set her off. Finally, she threw a satchel down in front of me. She pressed something on the wall and a nozzle came out of the wall.

I almost cried as I realized it was a shower.

"We're no pleasure ship. You get 2 minutes. Bag has gear."

She glanced at the blanket, grabbed it, turned and walked out of one of the disappearing doors. I pulled open the bag and flicked through it to find a ship suit and a bottle of cleanser.

The water turned on and I raced over, stripping my destroyed gown off as carefully as I could manage. I almost wept as the ice cold water hit my scales. The cleanser was harsh smelling and I imagined it was better suited to cleaning the floor, but at that moment it was magical.

The water clicked off and I started shivering. A harsh blast of almost arctic air hit me. I struggled against the cold. At least it dried me. My limbs were stiff and pulling the jumpsuit on sapped the last of my strength. I'd had a little vitae and bread and that was it. I curled up in a ball on the mattress, pulling my ruined dress over me, hoping to generate a little warmth.

The room grew colder and I could see my breath. My shivering stopped and I knew it wasn't because I was warm. It was a bad sign, dangerous, but I couldn't do anything to warm up. I felt myself slipping towards torpor. It would be so easy to just close my eyes and pull inward. I relaxed into the hard mattress, even as my mind fought against giving up, giving in; my body was pushed past its endurance.

I suddenly thought I could feel a body wrapping around me, warming me. I smiled and thought, "What a lovely final memory! I can pretend he was warming me, saving me." Before I could give in to that and let myself slip away, I heard a metallic shuddering and the room shook.

"What the everlasting fuck is going on here?" My eyelids fluttered open, and only the towering rage I felt through the bond kept me from torpor. All I could do was stare.

He plucked me from the ground as if I weighed no more than a feather and held me close to his chest. He strode out of the room into a dark hallway. I lost track of where we were going, focusing only on the warmth of his chest pressed against my face.

I was past noticing anything else when we entered a much warmer room and I warmed enough to start shivering. "Protocol Z451." He faced the wall with his body when a shower erupted around us. The water matched my body temperature and slowly began rising.

After a few moments, he stripped the sodden suit off of me and walked me into a pool of water. At first it was like being plunged into boiling water and I couldn't help but scream in pain. It was agony having my body temperature raised so quickly, and I sobbed.

After what seemed like an eternity, I opened my eyes. We were in a room very similar to the bathing rooms on my brother's ship. We floated in the pool, and he started rubbing his hands up and down my body, trying to banish the pain.

Until the pain turned to pleasure, and I realized I was completely naked and in his arms. His hands froze for a moment, then spun me around so I was facing him. He crushed me against his chest as one of his hands tangled in my hair and pulled my head back.

His mouth claimed mine, roughly. I was still too weak to seize him but I melted in his arms. He was sitting on a bench on the pools and my legs wrapped around his waist. He plundered my mouth and our tongues lashed together. With one hand still in my hair, he slid the other hand down my back and grabbed a globe of my ass, pulling me tight against him.

I could feel the thickness of his cock pressed against me, and I was lost. I writhed against him. He rose suddenly out of the water and laid me down on the edge. He stood between my legs and stared at me for an endless moment. His hands gentled and he slipped back down into the pool, hooking my knees over his shoulders.

Before I could think past my desire for him, he dropped a kiss across my mound, nibbling down past my clit. His fingers danced around my labia, gently stroking me until my hands grabbed his head. His tongue flicked at my engorged nub, and he slid one of his fingers into my waiting opening.

It stung, but his lips wrapped around my nub and he suckled as his finger eased into my tight opening. I was pinned down by his touch unable to do anything but feel him touching me until I finally exploded against him. I collapsed as lassitude swept over me. He stood, his hand at his waist undoing his pants.

I had to tell him. I looked up at him, the lust in his eyes. I didn't want to break the moment, but I was scared he would hurt me.

"Please be gentle." It was all I could get out. He paused, and I finally said, "I've never. I mean...please be gentle." His eyes dropped to my bound wrists, and he suddenly stepped back from me, horror creasing his face. I sat up and covered myself, vulnerable in a way I had never experienced.

He got out on the other side, his back to me, water cascading off his clothing. I rolled to my side and curled into a ball. I was humiliated. The look on his face, the hard line of his shoulders. I could hear him as he walked around the room, but I squeezed my eyes closed and buried my face into my knees.

He walked towards me, and I shook in fear. He'd threatened me, but now he knew that if he was going to take me, it wouldn't be with force, and that I would give him everything he wanted with a single touch. Then, he draped soft fabric over me, and stepped away.

His voice was gruff and curt. "Dry off." I cracked open my eyes, and I saw him standing facing away from me again. I sat up and gathered the towel around me and rubbed at my scales. "There's a suit on the bench. I can't leave you alone, I'm sorry. But I won't turn around."

My legs were shaky as I walked towards the bench. I scooped up the suit and sat down. I was rubbery and it took a thousand years to get dressed around the cuffs. I rested my head on my hands and wanted to weep. What did I say to him? I finally cleared my throat and said softly, "I'm dressed."

He turned and faced me and I flinched from him, but it wasn't anger on his face, it was something else. It was shock. He gestured at the now open door. I blushed as I walked into a room. It was clearly someone's sleeping quarters.
His
sleeping quarters. He moved quickly through the room to a simple antechamber.

He pointed at the divan, and I sat down. It was the first bit of comfort since I felt since I was taken and I wanted to sink into its fluffy depths and sleep for a thousand years. I wondered if he was going to let me rest here, or if I was going back to that cold, dark holding cell. My stomach made a loud grumble, and I looked away from him.

A tray moved into my vision. There was a steaming bowl of soup and more bread. I looked up at him, scared to reach for it. If he pulled it out of my reach, I would collapse. I wasn't sure how much time had passed, but the smell was divine and driving me absolutely mad.

He sat across from me and said, "Please, eat."

He touched my wrist gently. "My name is Sam."

"Hello Sam, my name is Thea."

"I thought your name was Thearaugqua Iztan Droqrolla."

"This is what my father named me, but my mother called me Thea." As much as he'd researched my family, I doubt he knew anything about my parents’ relationship. She was just never in public. Ever. My father forbade it after I was born.

For a heartbeat, I thought we might be able to connect on a deeper level, past the pains of the past, but the door opened and in strode his first mate. She scowled at me sitting on the couch, but turned her attention to Sam.

He said, "Ardal, you have a report?"

She said, "They received the ransom demand. Fighters scrambled immediately for the Hainthi Quadrant."

Whatever moment we might have shared was shattered when he stood up and laughed. He smiled at her, warmth in his face that I'd have given anything to have directed towards me. He said, "Well, then, I guess the plan is in motion."

They both looked at me, eyes hard as agate. He thumbed the device on his belt and the bonds reactivated on my wrists. He gestured at me and I stood. I wanted that moment back, desperately. I knew I was going back to the cold box that almost killed me before.

No reason to go down without swinging, in my own way. I lifted an eyebrow and mentally wrapped myself in every bit of princessly hauteur I could as I looked Ardal in the eyes.

I knew she’d been responsible for my near miss with death. "Don't be a coward next time you intend on killing me." I wiggled my bound wrists at her. "Clearly I'm unable to fight back. At least have the decency to look me in the eyes while you're attempting to murder me."

The other woman stepped back, and then a scowl crossed her face. Her words were hard and short. "I'm sorry you were uncomfortable, Princess, it was certainly not intentional. I had no idea you were so soft and weak, a delicate little flower."

I just kept staring at her. I had doubted she intended to kill me, but the end result would have been the same. I was on the cusp of entering torpor and they never would have known how to bring me back. I tilted my head and let the edges of my mouth lift in the imitation of a smile. "Knowledge is power, after all. Now you have the knowledge that my people do not handle excessive cold well.

I hated the woman glaring at me. How dare she accept Sam's attention, he was mine. A foreign feeling rose up in me. I wanted to rip her lying tongue out of her head. I started to see red. How dare she look at him? How dare his arm rest on hers? The sound of my hissing shocked me out of my building rage. Her eyes were wide and slightly frightened. He looked surprised.

I felt betrayed and utterly confused. My heart was racing and my palms were slick with sweat. I flexed my hands, trying to shake off the growing sensation that was burning inside of me. It was like a lightning bolt striking me when I realized...this was jealousy. This is what my father felt when he saw anyone near my mother. I started panting, short of breath, my throat constricting. I was just like my father, I had the worst, most soul-destroying form of
Pogona
.

I backed away from them the two steps I could before the backs of my legs hit the couch. It was taking everything in my power not to lose control. I took deep breaths and thought I wasn’t going to be able to control myself, to hold myself against the onslaught of pure fury. I wanted to rip her throat out with my teeth.

I covered my mouth with my hands, realizing I'd bared my fangs, that I was primed to attack. And then he touched her arm. Maybe he was going to send her away, or maybe he was comforting her. The thread binding my anger and holding me together snapped, and I launched at her.

I knocked him away from her. The captive bands bound my wrists together, but I could use my hands as a club, and I knocked her off her feet. My blinding rage gave me an unholy strength as I wrapped my hands around her throat.

She clawed at my hands, trying to break my grip, but my scales gave me more than enough protection against her feeble struggles. A red mist covered my vision and I tried to squeeze her head off when he tackled me.

It was like being hit by a shipping bot and the blow knocked me clear of her. Much like when I ran from him, his weight held me down on the ground. The red rage melted away as he held me down. At his touch, the flood of hurt and hate drained out of me, like it had never been there. I felt a connection to my father I'd never before understood or recognized. He couldn't control himself around my mother.

And I couldn't control myself around Sam. There seemed to be no solution. Even if we tried to break the bond, it had never been successful with this kind of
Pogona
. He flipped me over on my stomach, forcing my hands behind my back. He slapped another set of captive bonds on my ankles and pulled my feet up to my hands.

I didn't fight him. I couldn't. I could only direct my rage around him. If he understood what was happening, he would realize what kind of slave I could be to him and that all he had to do was fuck me and I would do anything he wanted.

I started to pray that Ardal would actually kill me for choking her. I kept my eyes squeezed shut, I couldn't bear to watch him comfort her. I wasn't sure how I would respond, how I would react. I wasn't sure what would happen if I had to watch.

I finally opened my eyes when I heard footsteps approach. It was her, and she was enraged. The imprint of my hands wrapped around her throat was visible. That satisfied something twisted and broken in me. But I was bound and helpless. Her boot pressed against my head, smashing my face into the ground, and I realized she clutched a Cracdar Whip in her hand. My brother favored them as well.

Her voice was raspy and broken. "On this ship, the crime of laying hands on the First Mate is 10 stripes laid down your back, as witnessed by the Captain." His eyes looked into mine. It didn't matter that I was a prisoner or that I'd been out of control of my actions. My captive bonds let go and I was stretched spread eagle. His eyes bored into mine, unblinking.

She cracked the whip in the air, and then laid the first stripe down my back. I cried out, the pain was like nothing I'd ever felt. I'd never been beaten or handled harshly. Even in combat class, it was completely different. This wasn't a blocked blow. Each line she ripped into me hurt more than the one before, and easily sliced through the thin shipsuit.

And he never looked away from me.

I slipped further and further away from myself until I was nothing but vibrating pain. I could feel myself falling into darkness, and I rushed to embrace it. My mate was letting this happen; he was watching, and he felt nothing. All I wanted was to disappear. But just as my consciousness began to fade, the pain stopped. No more blows fell, cutting into me.

I could feel blood flowing down my back. The agony of each breath sliced through me. The woman snatched me up by my hair and pulled my face into hers. She hissed as well as I had. "Whatever hold you have on him, I will destroy, stripe by stripe. Every day, I will find a reason to add to the lines down your back until you are nothing but scars and scales."

I counted my breaths as my old teacher taught me. I couldn't let him touch me again, even if it killed me. The bond was getting harder to resist.

I could tell he was coming closer to me, and I opened my eyes again. He reached down to me.

"Do. Not. Touch. Me." He froze. Then moved towards me again. "No." I wanted to shout, to roll away from him. He watched this happen. The drive was strong in me still. Lust and hate dominated my thoughts. I did nothing to him, and he brought me here. "You did this. You brought me here. You put me in her path. One of us will end up dead. The blood is on your hands."

He stepped back and said, "Blood dripping off your family's hands brought you here. You attacked my First Mate with no provocation. You are under ships rules."

"I'm your prisoner. Rules are for people who consent. I'm your slave."

My captive bonds suddenly released from the floor and I slowly rose to my feet. It took every bit of strength I have ever had, but I could not let him see my utter destruction. I stared him in the eyes, just like he did with every stripe she took out of my back. "Take me back to my cell now." He gestured at the coach. "Sit, let me put salve on that. You'll scar."

"I would rather scar than let you touch me again. Take me to my cell. Now."

"Don't be ridiculous, it will only take a moment."

"If you touch me again, I will do to you what I did to her. Except you don't have anyone to save you. Now, take me to my cell."

I was proud of myself. I forced my voice to stay even and calm. He couldn't know I would be totally unable to raise a hand against him, even to save my own life. The lines around his mouth grew hard and deep. Then he shrugged and the captive bands around my wrists snapped together.

"I assume you'll watch every time she beats me. Do you get off on it?"

He stepped towards me and I flinched. He stopped and growled in frustration. He pressed a button on his belt and a force beam ran from my wrists to his hand. He dragged me along, anger speeding his steps. Every step I took burned the lines in my back deeper. I could feel blood running down my sides and flanks. By the time we reached the cell, I was conscious only of putting one foot in front of the other.

I almost wept when I saw the thin foam mattress I'd almost died on. Pride fled and I staggered into the room, collapsing face first on to it. His feet stopped in front of me.

I muttered, "Get out."

He squatted and grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at him. I stared up, the edges of my vision frosted with pain and exhaustion. He said, "Please, let me help you."

"Please stop touching me."

"Fine, I won't touch you. But...I can't leave you like this."

I laughed a hollow, ugly sound. "Worried you might kill me before you've squeezed all your revenge out? Gonna watch her beat me again?"

His laugh echoed mine. Bitter, twisted sounds full of hate. I wondered if my agony echoed up the link, or if he felt any of it at all. He was human after all. Meli and I hadn't gotten to talk much, but it seemed like mostly all she felt was lust.

I closed my eyes. The fight had gone out of me, and pain overpowered me. The seconds stretched into days as he stood over me. He kept his word, he didn't touch me, but he fiddled with another of the devices at his belt. Was he going to finish the job with a whip of his own? Instead a cool mist settled over my back and took the worst of the pain with it.

Lethargy swept into pain's place and I could barely keep my eyes open. I almost wept at the relief.

I could hear the frustration in his voice. "It won't stop the scarring, if you don't let me put the salve on, but you should at least be able to sleep. We don't have the advanced medicine and medbots you’re used to, I'm sure. Frontier medicine. Let me help you."

I gathered the energy to shake my head and whispered, "no." I couldn't let him touch me. I was so far gone for him already, I couldn't bear to lose any more of myself to the
Pogona
. I remembered my mother with my father, nothing else existed except him. Not her friends. Certainly not her children.

I drifted into darkness, letting sleep claim me as he stood watching.